Bush announces help to expand use of Amber Alerts to find abducted children

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Emerging from a tear-filled private session with families of kidnapped children, President Bush said yesterday that "predators that are smooth and seductive" must be fought by expanding nationwide the system of broadcasting urgent bulletins when a child is taken.

"Our society has a duty, has a solemn duty to shield children from exploitation and danger," Bush told about 600 heartbroken but still-hopeful family members, law enforcement officials and experts gathered for a White House-sponsored conference. "One is too many, particularly for the mom or dad who suffers deeply."

Bush said the federal government would help turn the now-patchwork use of Amber Alerts into a coordinated nationwide network, with $10 million for training and equipment upgrades. He also announced the Justice Department would establish a national standard for the alerts and assign a new federal Amber Alert coordinator to boost cooperation among state and local plans.

A series of high-profile child abductions this year - Samantha Runnion and Danielle van Dam in California, Cassandra Williamson in Missouri and Elizabeth Smart in Utah among them - have filled the headlines and terrified parents.

Before his remarks, Bush held an emotional 45-minute meeting behind closed doors with about a dozen people involved in missing children cases.

Tamara Brooks recounted the day she and fellow teen Jacqueline Marris were abducted at gunpoint in Lancaster, Calif. The girls were rescued 12 hours later when sheriff's deputies closed in on their abductor's stolen car in a remote location - with the help of Amber Alerts, her mother said - and shot him to death.

The daylong White House Conference on Missing, Exploited and Runaway Children also sought to address youth homelessness, the trafficking of children for sex and labor, and the sexual solicitation and exploitation of children over the Internet.